Time to “lose your seat”

President Jacob Zuma announces his resignation at the Union Buildings in Pretoria. Picture: Siphiwe Sibeko/Reuters

JUST when I thought our country could not get even crazier, it just has.

Seriously, Mr Zuma, what’s the REAL reason you are clinging on to power? Why do you REALLY need three to six months to work out your resignation period?

At this point it looks like any one of the conspiracy theories doing the rounds could be the REAL reason.

I remember many (it feels like so much more) years ago when you said that you are a deployee of the ANC and that in whatever capacity the party deploys you, you will oblige.

What has happened now? Do you not feel the same sentiments you felt when you became president of the ANC? Maybe you were just delirious at that point, drunk with power.

One thing I was taught at a very young age is that no man is above the law, an organisation or whatever higher power you believe in.

I’m starting to think that maybe I wasn’t taught correctly and I should really consider either suing or writing to the Department of Education to give me some complimentary years at a higher institution of my choosing, as compensation for the wrong education I received.

Just by watching the drama unfold around me, it seems like one person is bigger and more important than everyone else.

I remember when the kids were a lot younger, now you need to know that we are quite a big family, so when you had a seat you held on to it for dear life. No matter how badly you needed to go to the bathroom, how thirsty you were or hungry, you just didn’t get up from your comfy seat.

It was so bad that when you still thought you were moving your bum to just get that extra little bit more comfy, there was another bum ready to slide in and take its place already.

When you got to the point where you just couldn’t hold out anymore, you planned your move very stealthily.

You’d wait for somebody else to get up, then plan it very meticulously down to the last second, and rush and come back.

Only to find that someone had indeed taken your seat.

I remember the absolute smugness, especially of the children, when you demanded your seat back. They would give an almost sadistic laugh and say, “Move your feet, lose your seat”.

It seems, like this very scenario is currently playing itself out.

Somebody is absolutely refusing to move his feet.

A similar situation comes to mind – yet again don’t ask me how long ago it happened – when our country was in exactly the same situation with Thabo Mbeki.

Now, if you recall, he was also visited by members of the National Executive Committee (NEC) and handed a letter asking him to step down. Yes, it took a couple of days, but Mbeki obliged and did the bidding of his party.

The obvious thread which is coming through is that not only does the ANC not want Zuma any more, but neither do the opposition parties.

At this moment in time, the chief whips are meeting in Cape Town on how to formalise the vote of no confidence in Zuma.

For once it seems like everybody is singing from the same hymn sheet, but heaven help us that all the parties will actually stand together for once.

No, we definitely can’t have that. It must all be ANC. Seriously, everybody it seems wants the same thing, why not for once show some unity?